Minutes of the meeting at La Rosa Hotel on the above date.
Present: Laura, Lesley, Michele, Pip, Ian, James (guest), Jenny (chair).
Apologies: Adele, Harry, John.
Topic: Members’ work-in-progress.
Matters Arising
Ian explained that a recent accident had worsened his deafness, so his participation would be minimal. For the present meeting he was delegating the chair to Jenny.
Jenny invited members to introduce themselves for the benefit of our guest (James).
Members’ Readings
Lesley — read a short story: Silent Night…
Karen finds herself in church on Christmas Day, with no memory of how she got there. She fears her husband’s reaction when he finds out she has left the house without permission.
Her husband Gerald is domineering and violent towards her, though charming to other people. As a result Karen has become isolated.
She goes home. Gerald returns with another woman, something he has never done before. The woman flees the house at Gerald’s outburst on seeing Karen, declaring she shouldn’t be there. With unprecedented courage, Karen declares she will haunt Gerald for a year for what he has done.
It is now revealed that Gerald has murdered Karen in a drunken rage, and buried her body in the woods. Her role now is to drive him to suicide in recompense for her years of suffering.
The following Christmas, with Gerald dead of alcohol and an overdose of painkillers, Karen (unseen) goes back to the church and fades away to the hymn: Sleep in Heavenly Peace.
A shocked discussion followed. Pip remarked it was an exceptionally dark story coming from Lesley. James saw the story as casting an unusual light on the nature of ghosts and their connection with souls.
Pip — read a hitherto missing chapter from Caicos Moon, her memoir of coming-of-age in the 1960s on the Caribbean island of South Caicos, where her father was the DC (District Commissioner). She was the only white girl on the island, which was garrisoned by a US Coastguard detachment (all male) crewing a navigational beacon (LORAN). She gains some notoriety among the Americans for her ability to laugh off a cigarette being stubbed out on her arm.
Pip’s elder brother, a planter in Malaya, visits them on holiday. A new white man on the island, David Frost, owns a speedboat and takes them swimming and water-skiing. The danger from barracuda is discussed, and to a lesser extent hammerhead sharks. Friends Sylvia and Peter also visit, but it will be the last time for Sylvia, who gets on the wrong side of Pip’s father (a man of strict morals) when she is discovered in a compromising position on the beach.
Michele — read a further instalment of her novel in-progress: The Undesirables, set in Southern Africa during the Boer War, 1898-1902.
The War has ended and soon the Camp will be opened and the internees allowed to return home. The Camp Superintendent agonises over the future of the orphan children. Anna and Finn continue working together as doctor and nurse/translator at both Camp Irene and the Black Camp, and spend every spare moment together. But future uncertainties stop them making any commitment to each other.
Mogau, who was raped on her arrest at Anna’s homestead, does not want to go home with Anna, but prefers to continue working at the hotel. The khaki officers will soon be leaving and paying guests will start coming once more. Mogau secretly hopes to set up a “proper family” one day with her co-workers, Boi and Kogisi.
Anna’s father Willem arrives at the camp to tearful reunions. Anna has to break the painful news of Jeanette’s physical and mental collapse and the deaths of the children from starvation and typhus.
Jenny — continued reading from her period novel in-progress based on the historical figure of Mary Eleanor Bowes, the heiress of a vast fortune from the Durham coalfields.
Irish adventurer Andrew Stoney cannot get his hands on heiress Hannah’s fortune until he has fathered a male heir by her. After a string of miscarriages, Hannah at last seems to be carrying a child to term. Andrew’s sister Sarah, sympathetic to Hannah and under no illusions about her brother, arrives from Ireland and takes the household in hand. But Hannah is in despair over the stillness of the unborn child.
An interesting discussion arose over how sexual and reproductive content should be handled. This is no longer purely an aesthetic consideration. Ian warned that after decades of progressive liberalisation, public attitudes are hardening once again. Publishers, especially in the USA, have to worry not only about religious lobbies and purging/defunding of public library boards (the Catholic Church is a stern and powerful lobby in the USA, though bland in England), but also about legal requirements to label all books with suitability for given age groups. This is of acute concern to writers specialising in the YA (Young Adult) market.
Writers should also note that the age of majority in most US states is 21, not 18 as in the UK. So “adult” material we’d be happy to see 20 year-olds reading might get banned in much of the USA as unsuitable for minors. This includes not only drug-taking or explicit sex scenes, but books condoning a gay lifestyle, or even the consumption of alcohol, for which 21 is the minimum age.
James — revealed his interest in sci-fi and the supernatural, and is looking for ways to embrace the two. Newly arrived in Whitby, allegedly replete with ghostly associations, he is frustrated by the indifference of the locals over such things, in marked contrast to South East Asia where he has been living.
Laura — was going to talk about drawing upon her “commonplace diary” for inspiration to write, but was challenged instead to talk about her “spiritual diary”. She revealed an interest in (Tibetan) Buddhism, particularly its tools (prayer beads) and techniques for meditation.
The meeting closed at 12:45 PM.
Whitby Writers Group 